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| Report on the First Annual Poverty Review Conference |
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3. OPENING SPEECH BY THE MINISTER OF FINANCE AND NATIONAL PLANNING, HON. EMMANUEL KASONDE, MP.
In his opening remarks, Honourable Kasonde indicated that he considered the conference a historical moment as it gave him a reason to reflect on real issues of poverty. Apart from this, the conference also gave him a reason to reflect on the strategies and interventions that government ought to effect in order to improve the lives of the people of Zambia.
The Honourable Minister acknowledged that poverty levels in Zambia had been persistently high and the problem widespread. He revealed that official statistics indicated that more than 70% of the people in Zambia were poor. He hoped that at the end of the conference, delegates would agree on the ways of addressing the poverty situation in Zambia.
He stated that the conference had come at the right time when the new government needed all the necessary information on poverty in order to come up with policies that were responsive to the needs of the poor. This was also the time when government was deeply involved in the Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRSP) process whose broad based ideas needed to be translated into reality.
He further noted that the poverty review activity was in line with the Poverty Monitoring and Analysis (PMA) objectives. These objectives are:
- Strengthening the capacity to provide timely information on poverty and social conditions and facilitation of the use of such information in policy making.
- Improving the sustainability of data collection and analysis as well as linking better policy activities with the available poverty and socio-economic data.
He pointed out that government attached great importance to the issue of poverty reduction. This was the reason why it had come up with the Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRSP) whose implementation would fully commence this year. He further pointed out that in the current budget the government had allocated a substantial amount of money towards the implementation of the PRSP programmes. The PRSP will among other things address the priority areas of agriculture, tourism, transport, communication, education, health, water, sanitation and good governance.
The Minister informed the conference that the government had embarked on a three-year Transitional National Development Plan whose main focus is poverty reduction. PRSP and other sector investment programmes would form the basis of this plan. He said that the Transitional National Plan would be linked to the National Long Term Vision, the Medium Term Expenditure Framework, the Public Investment Programme and the Annual Budget. Hence the conference would help government come up with vital information for this Transitional National Development Plan.
The Honourable Minister also commended the Zambia Social Investment Fund for all its activities in improving the standard of living of the Zambian people through its community-based projects. He commended the Central Statistical Office (CSO) as well for producing and making available the information required for these activities.
Mr. Kasonde lauded the efforts being made by institutions outside government such as the Participatory Assessment Group to provide government with information on the perceptions of the poor people of Zambia about their own poverty situation. He noted that such information was very critical to government in influencing policy and defining programmes for poverty reduction. He later took the opportunity to launch a book entitled The Poor of Zambia Speak compiled by the Participatory Assessment Group.
In conclusion he emphasised that the success of government poverty reduction programmes did depend on the performance of government as well as other stakeholders, including civil society. He therefore challenged the delegates and the institutions they represented to join hands with government in combating poverty.
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